361–365 of 365 posts
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Well I'd much rather have Advancement over Happiness. We can be happy our entire lives but if everyones dies before 100 and humanity never goes anywhere I wouldn't consider that a successful society. Happiness is masturbating 24/7 until you die. If you truly believe that is the goal of humanity I can't help but disagree.
How do you define "advancement" without happiness? What are you advancing toward?
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theres also religious folks who believe the earth was created specifically for humans, and so everything here is for us and us alone. I find it a rather disgustingly self centered ideology. To presume that one (or ones species) is the most important thing in the world (or universe) is basically the definition of narcissism
Except humans are the most important thing in the world. It's not narcissism if it's true. What's the point of even having a world if there are no humans in it? (Any conscious being, not just humans.) Animals don't care if they exist, they just do what they were born to do, they don't ponder existence. Neither do plants or rocks. Humans are the only ones (on this world at least) who actually care, and notice.
If anyone is wondering about the worldwide big picture of where electricity is coming from: I made this map / spreadsheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/16K4gNhy_AN8Eg4Ov3z7p...
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From my comment: "… pre-industrial … most people …" etc. There's been probably as much or more protracted and concerted propaganda from industrialists (who have more wealth and power to spread their messages) as the environmental sort. You're just fantasizing if you think there have been large populations of people who lived next to rivers on fire and horribly polluted air and water and litter and yet "didn't know th…
The fact that people lived close enough to observe rivers on fire might imply that they were willing to put up with it, for "progress" or "jobs." I don't think anybody lived right next to them. Zappa lays claim[1] to the first use of the word "pollution" in any popular ( meaning non-academic ) media, by virtue of a song title, "Nine Types of Industrial Pollution." That's from 1969. [1] no doubt erroneously - he just…
Of course there's relativity here. People who never had clean water won't complain about it the way those who had it and then saw it poisoned will. What's relevant is the change that the industrial revolution brought — including the WEALTH it brought that allowed people to be more secure and start caring about environmental issues since fewer of us worried about whether we would eat or whether we'd die of polio etc.
My point isn't that there's no environmental propaganda or that things things aren't complex. The point is that the environmental movement is based on real on-the-ground issues that were going to come up because of the issues. It's quite unreasonable to describe it as though it's just some sort of manufactured concern.